Alternative Hardware Implementation of the Remote Minefield Detection System

The Remote Minefield Detection system is currently implemented using VAX minicomputers, vector processors and transputers. It is desired that the system be implemented on more modern hardware, but it is important to know what kind of hardware. Thus, it is important to analyze the various algorithms used in the RMD system - Non-Suspect Region Rejection (NSRR), Local Region Thinning (LRT), Local Region Assemble (LRA), Region Split and Merge (RSAM), and Local Region Feature Extraction (LRFE) to determine their hardware requirements. These algorithms form the core set that make up the RMD, and are the ones to be re-implemented. Each algorithm is analyzed theoretically to find out its slow spots, and which processor would be suited for each algorithm. In the NSRR, it was limited to maximum contrast search in bands, something Single Instruction Multiple Data (SIMD) processors should perform easily. LRT required a processor with strong looping and floating-point calculations, especially multiplication and comparison. LRA required a processor that was able to move data quickly from one memory location to another as it extracted sub-images from the main image. TRUNCATED